


Quietly

by rainingover



Category: B.A.P, K-pop
Genre: Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Invisibility, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-19
Updated: 2015-12-19
Packaged: 2018-05-07 12:39:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,855
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5456804
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rainingover/pseuds/rainingover
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jongup has spent his whole life hearing origin stories about the heroes that make up the most well known squads of super heroes across the globe. </p><p>Some of them, the most beautiful, the most charismatic, become poster boys and girls for the next generation, and Jongup can't pretend that he had been immune to the hype in his adolescence.</p><p>He just never in a million years expected to turn out to be one.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Quietly

**Author's Note:**

  * For [awildneko](https://archiveofourown.org/users/awildneko/gifts).



When Jongup arrives at the facility, he's only known about his new destiny for a week. 

He spends his first night alone, shifting from visibility to invisibility, wakes up and wonders if he'll ever get it under control, if he'll ever really be able to make use of it, to become worthy of a team. 

It's weird, being here, surrounded by other trainee superheroes. Other people whose average, everyday lives aren't so average now that their powers have been revealed. Or, in some cases, now they've been revealed to have powers.

Jongup has spent his whole life hearing origin stories about the heroes that make up the most well known squads of super heroes across the globe. They're the subject of movies, of TV shows, of the graphic novels on his own bookshelf at home. Some of them, the most beautiful, the most charismatic, become poster boys and girls for the next generation, and Jongup can't pretend that he had been immune to the hype in his adolescence.  
  
He just never in a million years expected to turn out to be one. To have a power.

As the stories go, powers reveal themselves sometime between a person's twentieth and twenty first birthdays. No one knows exactly why, something to do with adulthood, he guesses, but it means that the twentieth year of anyone's life is always the most packed with the possibility of being plucked from obscurity to become something bigger, better.

Most people's twenty first birthdays arrive, nothing extraordinary occurring in between this birthday and the last, and they go on with their lives as normal -- begin to form career paths, relationships and think about their futures. Although some people, those with their heart set on the fame that being super human can bring, would claim disappointment when the year passes and nothing has changed, in reality, most people make it to twenty one glad in the knowledge that there are other people out there training to take on the weight of the world on their shoulders, so they don't have to.

Most people make it to twenty one, shrug and get on with life.

Jongup doesn't.

Jongup's twenty first birthday is still sixty two days away when he walks into the milkshake bar where he works just in time for his shift and realises just why everyone he had passed on the street had been giving him strange looks for the last seven blocks.

"You're just clothes," his co-worker hisses, his grip tight around Jongup's arm as he pulls him to one side.

"What?"

"You're just-- you need to go into the back room and check the mirror, Jongup. Now." He drags him towards the swing door that separates the stock room from the main store and away from the open mouths of customers. "You're fucking invisible! Why didn't you say you have a -- a  _super-power_?" The last word comes out in a hiss. 

"I don't," Jongup replies, all sorts of confused. He's only been awake for forty eight minutes, has slept in and had to run a little to make it in time. "Do I?"

"You tell me." his co-worker pushes him through the door. Gives him a withering look as though he's just fucked everything up. Although, Jongup guesses, he probably has, if he's arrived at work invisible during the mid morning rush hour on a Tuesday.

He stares into the mirror in the back room; confirms his co-worker's accusation. He's just clothes. Just walking clothes, in the reflection. It's a shame that his uniform has long sleeves ( _unnecessary_ long sleeves, as if it doesn't get hot making thirty milkshakes an hour), because if it hadn't he might have noticed sooner. Maybe not, since he's always just assumed his whole body is there, visible to the world. No one has ever told him otherwise, anyway.

It doesn't help that there's no way for him to hide it, his newly revealed super power, like he's heard some people try to. He waits in the stock room for three hours, until he glances up at the mirror and finds his face staring back again. His manager politely asks him to leave. Hands him his last week of pay in cash at the door.

The agency arrive at the door of his parent's house two days later and invite him to join them. They offer first class training, the chance to, "make something of his talents," and possibly "become a household name, a celebrated superhero." It's not really an invitation though. It's illegal for someone with known powers to live amongst the rest of society, so although they smile and act charming, and tell his parents that, "they have such a special son," he couldn't really turn them down even if he wanted to.

He leaves home less than a week later, says goodbye to his brothers, wraps his mother in a hug and tells her he will phone her every day, and gets into the waiting car.

The driver smiles and says, "Don't look so nervous."

The next time that Jongup spots his reflection in the rearview mirror, he can only see a floating jacket. He spends the rest of the journey with his eyes closed.

 

\--

 

Yongguk's power reveals itself the day after his twentieth birthday but he doesn't accidentally leave the house invisible. Instead he keeps his head down and realises after three weeks of waiting for a knock at the door that the authorities haven't gotten wind of the fact that he can go unseen for upto six hours at a time.

He has friends who have friends who are rumoured to operate without the authorities knowledge, and he stays with them for such a long time that he forgets that being part of an underground hero team isn't the norm.

The authorities catch up with him eventually, knock politely on his door one Sunday morning when he's still just in his boxers and suggest he joins them, hands over pamphlets, facts and figures. Tell him they believe he can do great things if he works with them. He guesses that he's being told, and not asked, to work with them, and maybe they don't expect him to be as compliant as he is, but then, he's had almost five years to get used to the idea of a mainstream agency, to expect this one day.

He does think about running, but then tries to think of the positives -- sure it's different, it's schedules and not being able to choose your own missions. It's being in the public eye and having eyes on you at all times, but it's not all bad. He's known people who have joined up, who have worked with the authorities at the agency and regretted it, but then, he's known people who have gone on to do big things, who have put their powers to great use in the public eye.

He doesn't run, and that's enough for the authorities. They decide to give him some privileges for his co-operation. Allow him to move into an empty dorm, tell him they can see he's the perfect person to build a new team around.

It's -- it's okay.

He trains at the designated times, stops training at the designated times, he even eats at the designated times. He just won't sleep when they tell him.

Can't sleep. Has never been a sleeper.

Instead, he works on things he shouldn't be working on, with people he probably shouldn't be working on them with. Still feeling like he's half underground, even in the brightly lit facility bedroom.

And, then, he receives a dormmate. Comes back from a training session to a bag in the doorway of his dorm, the door to the second bedroom ajar.

There is a jacket and shoes on the floor, and a t-shirt and jeans sleeping on the bed.

He knew he'd be joined by another trainee soon enough, but it's still kind of strange, watching the way that their form flickers between visible and not with the rise and fall of their chest. Yongguk guesses that the person inside the t-shirt hasn't quite mastered the art of invisibility just yet. They also don't seem to have been provided with one of the authority approved training suits, the ones that according to the spiel in the training video took a team of eighteen experts over two years to perfect; the ones that react with the body, that go invisible when you do.

They'd had suits underground too, except they were older models or ones that hadn't met the rigorous standards set by the authorities, that had been tested and then discarded. Suits that would suddenly stop working at three am and would mean he'd have to strip naked if he wanted to make it home unseen. He doesn't miss that aspect of being underground. He misses the people, he misses the freedom, but he doesn't miss the shit quality suits.

Yongguk figures he is probably never going to _feel_ like a bona-fide, mainstream, authority accepting superhero, but he knows he can be one. That he wants to set a good example for the youth of today, and maybe the youth of tomorrow, depending on how long-lasting his career is.

And for his future team, for the sleeping could-be hero in bedroom two.

He shuts the bedroom door and vows to take out his tongue piercing (definitely not on the uniform list) and go through the agency handbook properly in the morning.

 

\--

 

When Jongup wakes up it's dark outside, and he can't be sure whether it's after sundown or before sunrise, although he guesses they're basically the same thing, so it shouldn't really matter.

There are lights on in the hallway outside his room, which means that his dorm-mate is out there. He wants to make a good impression, or as good an impression as he can when he's having trouble staying visible for more than twenty seconds at a time.

He steps out into the hallway, looks down at his bare feet, to check they're visible. When he looks up again, his dorm-mate is in front of him.

"You'll get used to it," his dorm-mate says, although Jongup knows there isn't any way for him to be sure.

Jongup fidgets with the hem of his t-shirt, feeling awkward and exposed. He'd been told his dorm ate was older, that he's had his own powers for years. He isn't sure he feels quite worthy of being assigned to his future team yet. He rocks in his heels for something to do, says, "I'm not sure I know how to."

His dorm-mate just says, "Well, I'm here for you now."

And maybe it's the sincerity in his voice, or maybe it's just the fact that he's the only person Jongup has right now, but something about the way he says it makes Jongup think that he means it completely.

"Thank you," Jongup says and accepts the milky coffee that Yongguk passes him, even though he actually only likes the milk part of it.

 

\--

 

Jongup trains less than he thought he would. He's brand new, and he's still harnessing his ability, so he's advised he will only be training three times a week. Is advised to focus on being able to control his invisibility, that once he can control it, he'll be more use.

He's used to lazy days off, long stretches spent in bed or in front of the TV, but that was back when staying in was choice. Now that he has no other option, now that he spends night after night in the dorm alone, it feels less indulgent and more like a timeless sea of frustration.

Yongguk trains a lot, and when he isn't training he seems to content to be alone. Jongup understands, has never been one to need constant company. He tries not to hover for too long after they eat dinner, slips into his room as soon as his favourite TV show ends of a night. Doesn't want to be a burden.

The words tumble out of him one night as he stares at the screen, concentrates on staying in one state. He breathes in and out slowly in the way his favourite teacher advised.

"What if I never get it under control?" He asks Yongguk, who is sitting across the room.

Yongguk looks up. "You will."

Jongup presses, "But if I don't?" He misses a beat in his breathing, glances at where his hands were half a second previously. "Shit."

Yongguk closes his notebook. "Do you _want_ to control it? Do you _want_ to be here?" He asks.

"Yes," Jongup replies. He does, so much. Maybe that's the problem.

"Then you will," Yongguk smiles. It's a smile that reminds Jongup of his first night in the dorm, of when Yongguk told him with certainty in his voice that he was there for him.

It's a smile Jongup trusts.

When he looks down again his hands are back to being in view.

 

\--

 

After a while, once Jongup isn't considered as new, when he's mastered the art of invisibility a little more than he had (but not enough, not yet), he finds some training sessions added to his timetable that match up with Yongguk's.

It's just the odd session here and there, the ones that include all of those at the facility with the power of invisibility. Yongguk at one side of the room, concentration etched into his face, Jongup at the other, trying to take everything in, wondering how it is that he's here, waiting to debut as a super hero for the nation, for the world. Training and being trained, being told what to eat and when and how and how to make yourself invisible on cue. It's kind of baffling to really think about.

Some days Jongup still mourns the loss of an average life. Misses the time when his biggest aim for the week was thinking up an extravagant concoction for the menu at the milkshake bar, instead of being able to stay visible for three hours. Misses playing computer games instead of feeling like he's fallen into one. Other days his new life all makes a lot more sense. It feels real.

When he's struggling, he still thinks of Yongguk's words. The few he's really spoken. They don't talk a lot; Jongup gets the impression that Yongguk is a man of almost as little words as he is most of the time, but Jongup has a feeling that, should the time come to it, he will be able to rely on Yongguk. With his life, if needs be (and needs probably will one day, what with them going to be superheroes and all.)

Yongguk nods to him in the dining hall on a Tuesday, leaves him a plate of fresh chicken in their shared fridge on Wednesday night, murmurs goodnight as he passes his room at four am on a Thursday.

He's never really _there_ , and, yet, he still feels present, like he's taking care of him unseen, the words he spoke on Jongup's first day at the facility ringing in Jongup's head whenever he feels alone.

 

\--

 

Jongup has been training under the agency for two months when Yongguk returns to their dorm from the dining hall at six twenty two and wakes Jongup by placing an ice cold chocolate milkshake on the vanity unit next to his bed.

Jongup can't tell whether Yongguk is up early or just hasn't slept yet. He doesn't seem to do much of it, and Jongup is intrigued by his ability to work constantly.

"You should sleep more," Jongup says, as Yongguk slips back out of the room.

Yongguk hangs back, the flicker of an amused smile across his face. "We can't all sleep for twelve hours straight," he points out.  
  
"True." Jongup ponders this. "But maybe you should try it sometime."

"I'll let you know if I want to."

"If you never want the company -- I could nap with you instead," Jongup offers.

"You don't have to do that." Yongguk laughs softly.

"I know." Jongup sits up, knows he should maybe let the subject rest, but can't. "Hyung? You know I'm here for you too, right?"

"I know," Yongguk says, but he's already out of the room.

 

\--

 

Jongup has a really good day; stays visible for two hours and thirty two minutes during training, even during intense exercise. His teacher says, "You're really improving," and he thinks that maybe he is.

He tells Yongguk as much later, as they pass each other in the corridor between their rooms. "I think it was the milkshake you brought me that did it. A milkshake in bed is probably the most indulgent thing I've done since I got here." He smiles. "Although, I think it was only made with one cup of chocolate powder, and I usually use two for our customers back at the store. Used to, I mean."

Yongguk raises an eyebrow. "You worked at a milkshake cafe?"

Jongup nods. "I was hoping to open my own one day. And then a whole franchise of them."

"You still could, one day. After this."

"Maybe," Jongup shrugs, but he realises that maybe he doesn't want to open one any longer at all, that when he pictures how things will be in five years time he pictures being here, being with a team, being a superhero. "I think I'm making progress here, though. I think-- I can do this."

"I know you can do it." Yongguk places a hand on his shoulder. The first time he's ever done more than brush past him on the way out of the dorm door. It's comforting. He leaves his hand there for a few seconds. Says, "Trust me," and lets go.

"I do," Jongup replies, and he really means it.

 

\--

 

"I've got another assignment," Jongup mentions after dinner one evening.

"Yeah?" Yongguk looks tired, has been training for nine hours, and Jongup feels guilty for taking up Yongguk's rest time, not that he uses it much.

"I have to try to go four hours in one state and then as soon as four hours end, I have to try to switch states on cue." Jongup holds his hands out in front of his face. "How do you usually prepare for switching on cue?"

Yongguk takes off his boots. "With me, with a lot of people, it's about staying calm, but you seem like a calm person already."

"I am. I think my problem so far has been concentration," Jongup admits. "I get-- distracted easily, and everything here is new, different. It's difficult to really concentrate."

Yongguk nods. "Makes sense. So, you need to find something to concentrate on. When does the four hours begin?"

"It started five minutes ago."

"Oh-- then what are you concentrating on?"

"Right now?" Jongup looks up from his hands. "You." He looks at Yongguk hopefully.

Yongguk opens his mouth, closes it again.

Jongup realises his mistake. Says, "I'll just start again, though, if you have things to do. I mean, four hours is a long time, you just happened to come home and-- Sorry." Jongup fiddles with the sleeve of his training suit.

Yongguk laughs. "It's fine. So, we have four hours to kill?"

"You don't have to-- just go about your normal routine. I'll just be here."

Yongguk ignores him. Asks, "Shall we watch a movie?" as he picks up the TV controller and looks at Jongup expectantly.

Jongup hesitates. Searches Yongguk's eyes for hints that he's only here because he feels he has to be, because Jongup's admission is making him feel guilty, or burdened, or both.

He can't find any. "That sounds good. You can pick." He smiles.

Yongguk smiles back.

 

\--

 

Jongup realises two hours in that this is the longest amount of time he has spent in the same room as his future group's leader.

They live together, sure. They sometimes even train together now. Plus, there is that increasingly likely possibility that they're one day going to be fighting the world's biggest enemies together. And now they're watching a movie, Jongup half concentrating on the plot, not that there really is much of one, luckily, since he doesn't want to get too drawn into the story, part of his mind always on making sure his body is visible every time he glances down.

Yongguk laughs at the punch-line of a bad joke, head thrown back, teeth bared. It's the happiest Jongup has seen him, and he notes that Yongguk looks more handsome when he smiles. Says as much.

Yongguk just replies, "You're always smiling."

Jongup wonders if that means Yongguk thinks he's handsome too, but he doesn't ask. Instead he checks his hands are still in plain sight, sneaks glances as Yongguk bursts back into laughter over the movie, and feels grateful for the company of someone so easy to feel at home with.

 

\--

 

 

Jongup makes it to four hours and eight minutes before it's time to test out his ability to switch to being invisible on cue. He takes a deep breath and focuses hard, but nothing happens. He tries again, concentration filling every pore. He can feel ridges in the skin between his eyebrows as he wills the invisibility to come.

"You can do it." Yongguk is still there, just, hovering at the edge of the room, the movie over, their routine of passing in the night almost about to recommence.

"It's not--" Jongup starts, stares at his hands, willing them desperately to just disappear goddamnit. He wants this so badly now, he wants to be useful, to use his powers, to be successful. He doesn't want to have to leave the training centre, be employed in some admin role in the government, wherever failed trainee heroes go. He wants to stay _here_. With Yongguk.

"You can do it." Yongguk is back in the room, at his side, hand on his shoulder. "Trust me."

Jongup closes his eyes, deep breath in, a long exhale. When he opens his eyes he knows that he can't be seen.

"I did it."

"Of course you did. " Yongguk smiles, a real grin; all teeth and gums and laughter.

"Your turn, hyung." Jongup wants to see how fast Yongguk can make the switch, give himself something to aim for one day, when he's as confident with his ability as his future leader.

Yongguk is gone within two seconds flat, and Jongup is suddenly glad that his own face can't be seen, knows that the vast amount of admiration and awe he is currently feeling would be clear if he was visible right now.

"You'll be able to change like this soon."

"I hope so." Jongup really does. "Thank you for tonight."

"You don't have to thank me, I-"

Jongup cuts in. "You're here for me, I know."

There is a pause. "I am, but I was going to say was that you don't have to thank me because, honestly? I've not enjoyed myself this much in months."

"Oh." Jongup is caught off guard, realises that he's looking down at his feet, that he's changed back to a visible state again. "Well-- I'm glad. Happy."

"Me too," Yongguk says, and Jongup wonders whether Yongguk still has that grin on his face.

He hopes so. Yongguk deserves to smile more often, and even just picturing his big, light-up-the-room grin makes Jongup feel warm. "Will you turn back to visible again?" He asks. "I feel a bit like I'm talking to myself."

When Yongguk's face appears again he's still smiling.

 

\--

 

Yongguk stops staying out as late, stops spending hours locked in his room. He starts to kick off his shoes at the door and sit down next to Jongup on the sofa after training.

Sometimes he reaches for the TV controller and asks, "What are we watching tonight?" though Jongup knows he isn't interested in most of the stuff on television.

It's familiar now, the way they live in quiet dependence on each other's company, without talking much about it. They don't _need_ to talk about it. Jongup sometimes thinks that too much talking can muddle things, that there sometimes just isn't a need for discussion or definition. It's like that with Yongguk. Quiet and comfortable.

It's sometime after eleven on a Thursday and Yongguk comes back to the dorm after a four hour training session.

"What do you even need training in?" Jongup asks. "You've been using your power for years."

"Exactly. I've already developed my own ways of doing things. Bad habits, apparently."

Jongup ponders this. "Do you ever wish you hadn't joined the agency? That you'd stayed underground?"

"No." Yongguk rubs at the back of his neck, rolls his shoulders. "Well-- sometimes. I did, anyway. Not lately, though."

The look he gives him right after he says this, makes Jongup wonder whether there is weight behind his words. If Yongguk is suggesting that their collision of routines is one of the reasons he's becoming more content with the trainee life. Whether he's suggesting Jongup has anything to do with it.

Jongup isn't going to pretend that Yongguk hasn't been one of the main reasons that he has firmly decided that the milkshake bar is just a back up plan, that this is what he wants to do. Jongup knows that if Yongguk hadn't reassured him on that first night, if Yongguk hadn't been there quietly in the background, and now, in the foreground, here, closer, he wouldn't feel so at home.

The credits begin to roll on the TV show Jongup had been half watching and he yawns unconsciously.

Yongguk yawns too. Says, "I could go to sleep right here, right now."

"You can, I don't mind."

Yongguk closes his eyes. Absent-mindedly tugs at Jongup's sleeve. "Aren't you tired as well?"

"Kind of," Jongup admits, "But you should go to bed, really. Lie down properly, get some real rest." 

Yongguk doesn't respond to his suggestion. "It's warm," he says between shallow breaths. "You're a very calming influence, you know that?"

"I don't know about that," Jongup replies. "I think you just don't get enough sleep."

Yongguk says, "Maybe," and Jongup closes his eyes too, rests his head against Yongguk's shoulder, drifts off to the background noise of the TV.

 

\--

 

It happens more often; Jongup nods off in front of the TV and finds Yongguk there next to him, fast asleep, when he wakes up hours later. Checks the clock and figures Yongguk has been back in the dorm for an hour. Jongup wonders if Yongguk has eaten, remembers left overs in the fridge and stands up to go and investigate them.

Yongguk's eyes flutter open softly at the movement. "Hmm, where you going?"

"Just to check on--" Jongup starts.

"Nah," Yongguk cuts in, reaches out and curls his fingers around Jongup's wrist. "Stay here." 

It's the first time that Yongguk has asked Jongup not to leave the room, and something jumps in his chest. "Okay," he says, allows Yongguk to pull him back down on the sofa and wrap his arm around Jongup's waist. 

When Jongup wakes up, Yongguk is snoring softly against the back of his neck. The light from the TV flickers across the room. Jongup lifts his free hand, takes a deep breath and concentrates. It only takes him twenty six seconds to make himself invisible, a new record.

He contemplates waking Yongguk up to tell him, but remembers how little sleep he gets, so he simply turns of the TV and closes his own eyes again instead.

 

\--

 

Yongguk says one morning, "I'm in a really good mood and I don't know why."

Jongup is slipping on his sneakers by the door, his morning training session starting soon. "Do you need a reason?"

Yongguk sips his coffee. "No," He pauses. "It just feels like there is one."

"Maybe it's because you're well rested."

Yongguk laughs. "Maybe. Maybe it's because I'm spending so much time with someone who rarely frowns." 

Jongup grins. Says, "Maybe. I still think it's the sleep, though."

 

\--

 

Yongguk isn't there when Jongup returns from training, and it becomes pretty obvious that Yongguk is avoiding him.

Jongup promises his favourite teacher that he'll be able to shift his state in under five seconds within the week.

Concentrates until he thinks he might black out. Manages it in twelve seconds during class, by which time the trainees acting as armed thieves have already shot him six times (at least, they would have, if they were real.)

His teacher says, "Better," but Jongup knows she means, "You're not quite good enough."

He wants to ask Yongguk to help him train, but Yongguk is back to haunting their dorm; slipping in at random hours, a shadow in the corridor after training, an invisible man.

(Even when he's not invisible.)

 

\--

 

Yongguk hasn't sat next to him on the sofa for four days and counting. Jongup watches TV as usual, whilst Yongguk floats from room to room, sits at the table in the corner of the shared lounge area for all of twelve minutes, before he's tapping his forefinger distractedly on the table next to his laptop and looking as though he is itching to get away.

Jongup wants to ask him if he's just imagining the distance between them, but Yongguk continues to slip in and out of the dorm at even odder hours than usual, until Jongup realises he's going to have to make camp and just wait him out if he's going to ever figure out what is going on.

Jongup isn't a confrontational person, something which some of his teachers find useful, and some find conflicting to their superhero training agenda.

He isn't confrontational, but he knows that he's going to have to corner Yongguk soon if he's ever going to figure out why he's suddenly become so absent from his life, just as it was really starting to feel as though they really did have each other to lean on.  
  
Jongup catches him as he returns to their dorm two nights later, where Jongup is waiting, half watching television and half watching the door. Even if Yongguk can switch on his invisibility on cue, he can't walk through doors, so that's something at least.

Jongup switches the TV off as Yongguk slips in through the door, hood pulled low, rain dripping from his eyelashes. "Shit," he says when he realises Jongup is there.

"Why does it seem like you're avoiding me?" Jongup asks.

There is a pause before Yongguk clears his throat and says, "I've heard stories about past leaders being-- tested by the authorities during training. To check they're suitable to lead, that they're on top of their game."

"What?"

"You talk a lot about the invisibility, but... You have a secondary power, right? Why isn't it in your file?"

"I-- hyung, I don't know what you're talking about." Jongup had been hoping for Yongguk to laugh when he'd mentioned feeling like he was being avoided. For Yongguk to laugh and mention something about being busy lately.

He does laugh now, but it's not a happy laughter, instead it's brimming with sadness. A soft ripple of laughter as he runs a hand through his hair. "It works, by the way. It really works. And it'll be useful for the team we end up being in -- having an Empath who can also harness invisibility. If you manage to harness it," He says. 

Jongup fiddles with the sleeve of his suit. "I'm confused."

"Tell me about it," Yongguk mutters, pulls back his hood and runs a hand over his damp hair.

"No, really," Jongup stresses. "I can't control your emotions."

Yongguk is looking right at him now. "You're not-- the authorities haven't just asked you to keep it quiet? I don't blame you, I just--"

Jongup shakes his head. "I have one power. The same as you, the same as the others I train with. Just invisibility. I don't influence other people's moods, I can't control them. I'm just-- I'm just here trying to figure out how to make use of the fact that I seem to spend half my time invisible now. That's all."

"Oh."

Jongup tries out a smile. "Hyung, why did you think I was an Empath?"

Yongguk sighs. "Honestly, Jonguppie? You make me happy. I'm calmer around you, I'm relaxed. I sleep."

"Isn't that good?" 

"Yes-- no. I don't know." He looks frustrated, takes a breath. "I'm not used to relying on someone else. I thought-- That morning when I felt so happy and I didn't even know why. I suddenly thought back to the stories of being tested, I thought maybe this wasn't real. Maybe that's what I wanted to believe. I've just gotten so used to dealing with things alone, without relying on company..."

"Enjoying someone's company isn't a weakness." Jongup bites his lip. "I feel that way around you too and I know you don't have any extra powers."

There is the hint of a smile on Yongguk's face as he stands in the doorway. "I need to go out again, but I'll be back, okay?"

And Jongup knows he means it.

 

 

\--

 

Jongup wakes up on the sofa to a hand on his shoulder. Yongguk is there, reassuring warmth in the darkness.

"I'm sorry," He says, almost a whisper, places what smells suspiciously like a very chocolatey chocolate milkshake down on the coffee table next to him.

"For what?" Jongup moves up, gives Yongguk room to sit down.

"For-- before." He sits. "For accusing you."

"I've been accused of worse things than being an _extra_ super superhero before. I'd say that was more of a really weirdly delivered compliment."

Yongguk laughs, his gums showing, eyes creased into a genuine smile. "I know that enjoying your company isn't a weakness, it's-- it's good."

Jongup smiles back. "And you don't just enjoy it because I'm making you with some power I don't have."

"It _is_ because of you, though. Just not-- not in the way I wanted to believe." Yongguk wraps an arm around his shoulder. "I'm glad you're here."

"Of course I'm here, this _is_ my dorm too." Jongup points out, although he knows full well that isn't what Yongguk meant.

Yongguk rolls his eyes. "You know what I mean."

"I know." Jongup grins. "Is that for me?" He points to the drink.

Yongguk nods. "Double chocolate. I know they make you happy."

"Like you do," Jongup replies, takes a sip in content silences. He likes the quiet of their time together, the feeling that they have each other's back, that they always will now.

"I could go to sleep right here, right now." Yongguk finally says, pulls Jongup's body closer.

"You should," Jongup points out, closing his eyes again as he rests his head against Yongguk's arm. "We both know you should sleep more."

"True" Yongguk murmurs. "But when we wake up I'm going to test you on how quickly you can switch states, 'kay?"

"I bet I can manage it in less than five seconds," Jongup replies, the last word almost inaudible as he falls back into a comfortable sleep. "No, four."

And six hours later, he does.


End file.
